1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a genetic robot system, and more particularly to determining expression behaviors of a genetic robot.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a genetic robot represents an artificial creature, a software robot (sobot) or a normal robot which has its own unique genetic code. Also, a robot genetic code corresponds to one robot genome which is composed of a plurality of artificial chromosomes. A sobot generally represents software including an artificial creature, which sometimes functions as an independent software agent capable of interacting with a user, and which sometimes functions as an intelligence unit of a robot, enabling a hardware robot to cooperate with a sensor network, while moving through a network.
A plurality of the artificial chromosomes defined in the robot genome define a unique individuality or personality of a robot, which determines changes in internal states including motivation, homeostasis and emotional states of the robot through interacting with the external environment of the robot, and determines behaviors expressed according to the changes. The artificial creature, the motivation, homeostasis, emotion and behavior are defined as described in Table 1 below.
TABLE 1ArtificialAn artificially created object, which acts according to motivationCreatureof itself, has emotion, interacts with human, and can select one of behaviors.PersonalityA determiner of all or a part of behaviors, rather than a simplysummarized technology of the behaviors. When a creature isregarded as a person, the personality may correspond to acharacter. This is a concept including motivation, homeostasisand emotion. That is, a personality engine represents an engineincluding motivation, homeostasis and emotion. This is adeterminer to generate a variety of internal states and behavior expressions.MotivationA process of awakening a creature to an activity so as to maintainthe activity and controlling the pattern of the activity. Thiscauses the creature to select and perform an activity. Forexample, there are curiosity, familiarity, boredom, a desire toavoid, a desire to possess, a desire to rule, and so on.HomeostasisA function that enables a creature to stabilize its physiologicalstate as an entity, even while the creature is ceaselessly receivingchanges in the internal and external environments thereof. Thiscauses the creature to select and perform an activity. Forexample, there are hunger, sleepiness, fatigue, and so on.EmotionA subjective vibration caused when a creature performs abehavior. For example, there are happiness, sadness, anger, and fear.BehaviorA general term for all actions, for example, moving to or stoppingat a specific point, which are performed by an entity. In case ofanimals, sleeping, eating, and running may be examples. Thenumber of behaviors which an entity can select is limited. Eachentity can perform only one behavior at one time.
The artificial chromosomes include essential-element-related gene information, internal-state-related gene information and behavior-determination-related gene information. The essential-element-related gene information represents essential parameters which may exert a great influence on changes in internal states and on external behavior expressions. The internal-state-related gene information represents parameters which relate to external stimulations applied to the robot and exert influence on the internal states of the robot. The behavior-determination-related gene information represents parameters which determine external behaviors corresponding to currently-determined internal states.
The internal states include motivation, homeostasis and emotion states. That is, the internal states of a robot may be determined according to each internal-state item and internal-state parameters (i.e., internal-state-related gene information) according to each external stimulation, as shown in Table 2 below.
TABLE 2StateInternalExternalMotivationHomeostasisEmotionStimulationFamiliarity. . .HostilityHunger. . .SleepinessHappiness. . .SadnessTouching80. . .−400. . .040. . .−20Strike−30 . . . 500. . .0−30 . . . 30Surprising 0. . . 50. . .010. . . 0. . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. . .. . .Pacifying40. . .−400. . .050. . .−50
Even in the case of the behavior-determination-related gene information, a table similar to Table 2 may be made, except that various expressible behaviors are included in place of external stimulations. That is, in a case of behavior-determination-related gene information, included are parameters for specific behaviors corresponding to each internal state, that is, parameters for expressing each behavior according to the parameter values of internal states, such as motivation, homeostasis, emotion, etc.
Also, essential parameters which exert a great influence on a change in each internal and on each external behavior expression may include whether there is volatility, an initial value, an average value, a convergence value, an attenuation value as time passes, and a specific value specially determined at a specific time. These parameters may be configured as separate essential-element-related gene information. Therefore, essential-element-related gene information includes whether there is volatility, an initial value, an average value, a convergence value, an attenuation value and a specific value, according to each internal state, that is, according to internal states of motivation, homeostasis and emotion. As described above, a robot genome includes essential-element-related gene information which is composed of parameters of essential elements for internal states, changes in each internal state, and external behavior expression, internal-state-related gene information which is composed of parameters for various external stimulations and the internal states corresponding to the external stimulations, and behavior-determination-related gene information which is composed of parameters for various expression behaviors and the internal states corresponding to the expression behaviors. That is, a robot genome may be expressed through a two-dimensional matrix, which includes internal states, and gene information for essential elements, external stimulations and expression behaviors corresponding to each internal state, as shown in Table 3 below.
TABLE 3MotivationHomeostasisEmotionFamiliarityHostilityHungerSleepinessHappinessSadnessEssentialVolatilityEssential-Element-Essential-Element-Essential-Element-ElementInitialRelated GeneRelated GeneRelated Genevalue(Motivation)(Homeostasis)(Emotion)AttenuationvalueExternalTouchingInternal-State-RelatedInternal-State-Internal-State-StimulationStrikeGeneRelated GeneRelated GenePacifying(Motivation)(Homeostasis)(Emotion)ExpressionLaughingBehavior-Determination-Behavior-Behavior-BehaviorLookingRelated GeneDetermination-Determination-about(Motivation)Related GeneRelated GeneTumbling(Homeostasis)(Emotion)
Therefore, a conventional robot platform is constructed to determine a specific expression behavior according to a current internal state, that is, according to the states of the motivation, homeostasis, emotion, and so on, and to perform the specific expression behavior. For example, when a current internal state of a robot corresponds to a hungry state, the robot platform determines the robot to perform a behavior of teasing a user for something, and the robot behaves correspondingly. Accordingly, the robot may be implemented to perform such a behavior as in real life.
However, as described above, a conventional robot determines and performs a behavior according to a change in only the internal state of the robot. That is, a conventional robot is implemented without taking into consideration an instinctive behavior which a real life performs. For example, when a user strikes a creature, the creature will reflexively try to defend against or avoid the strike if the creature is a real life. However, a conventional robot, as described above, recognizes an external stimulation, updates an internal state of the robot according to a result of the recognition, and then performs a behavior corresponding to the recognition result. Accordingly, when recognizing a “strike” action by the user, a conventional robot may perform a corresponding behavior after decreasing a value of a familiarity parameter and increasing a value of a hostility parameter, but it is impossible for a conventional robot to perform such an instinctive behavior as a real life would.